Or was it realisation in Lisbon that resistance is hard to sustain when the bond market forces you to pay 6% for 12-month money? Probably both.

Either way, the financial powerhouses of the eurozone have wanted Portugal to accept aid for months. A "responsible" decision, said Olli Rehn, EU commissioner for monetary affairs. Indeed, Brussels may even regard now as a good moment for Portugal to swoon. Fear that investors would train their sights on Spain has receded since new year. Spanish bond yields are stable at about 5% and investors are less suspicious that its banking system contains hidden horrors. Nor does anyone doubt that the EU's coffers can bear the strain of supporting Portugal: €60bn may be all it takes, which is well within the scope of the European financial stability facility.

In practice, though, nothing is straightforward. Can a caretaker government in Lisbon negotiate a bailout? Prime minister José Sócrates has doubted that in recent weeks. It is a critical point, because aid for Portugal may turn out to be a two-stage affair: a bridging loan to get through the summer debt repayments; then the real thing, complete with the harsher medicine that Sócrates warned would be prescribed by the EU and IMF.

Such a timetable leaves a lot of time for events to develop. The idea is gaining ground that piling greater austerity onto Greece, Ireland and now Portugal is bad economics. Where is the growth supposed to come from? Wouldn't it better to lighten the debt burden by forcing creditors to share some pain?